Diageo seems to be engaging in some revisionist history on Dickel's behalf. They now have George and his wife, Augusta, visiting Tullahoma in 1867, where he dreams about "creating the finest, smoothest sippin’ whisky," and then "In 1870, Dickel’s dream came true, and a company which bore his name was opened at Cascade Hollow, Tennessee."

Both, based on everything else I can find out about Dickel's history, appear to be complete fabrications.

One purpose seems to be to obliterate both the independent history of the Cascade Distillery (which was, by all accounts, established in 1877 and never actually owned by Dickel) and diminish the role of the Shwab family (which the Dickel web site misspells as Schwab, like the stock broker), much like Four Roses has built up John Paul Jones at the expense of Rufus Rose.

The "four daughters" story may be false too. The most likely explantion is this: Rufus Rose had a brother and a son, and the brother had a son, all of whom worked in the business, and they were the original "Four Roses."

That, of course, isn't even remotely romantic so the Roses may have been the ones who cooked up the four daughters story.

Why do they do it? Rights may have something to do with it. With Dickel, there are still members of the Shwab family around who might expect some compensation if their ancestor's name is used. Beam gets into it with their conceit that the only Beams are the Noes, i.e., the only descendants of Jim Beam, when there are scads of Beams running around, including some who were distillers at Jim Beam.